Crunch Time Draws Near

Like a college student who waits until the last minute to do a term paper, the state Legislature is leaving a lot of business hanging as it approaches the June 23 deadline for lawmakers to go home for the summer.

Several of those issues are environmental, including the state brownfield tax credit program, which is directing millions of taxpayer dollars to high-end projects that require minimal pollution cleanups. And there is also the Bigger Better Bottle Bill, which would extend the nickel bottle deposit to water and other non-carbonated beverages, and net metering, which would add to solar power by allowing commercial properties to trim their power bills by plugging into rooftop solar systems, something that has been limited to homeowners for about a decade. Think of all that open rooftop space on Colonie Center _ or in downtown Manhattan.

This week, Department of Environmental Conservation Commissioner Pete Grannis chided state lawmakers to change the brownfield program, so more of tax credits (translation: money from all of us…) go into cleanups and less go into new buildings. He said the project has turned into a “gold mine” for developers, while not doing enough to deal with and industrial legacy of polluted lands, particularly in blighted cores of cities and in upstate.

Here is the shorthand for what’s at stake. Gov. David Paterson wants to limit the tax credits only $15 million for buildings on any project. That’s a far cry from what’s happened so far, when some buildings constructed after tiny cleanups have yielded credits totalling more than $100 million. Assembly Democrats are willing to put that cap at a more-generous $50 million. And the state Senate, where developers have been calling for the status quo, has not yet weighed in on any cap. Inaction means status quo. Stay tuned…

HIGH GAS PRICES GOT YOU DOWN?

Everyone is looking for ways to cut their gas bills. Some of the tips are easy to understand, like consolidating trips and driving slower. Changing to a more fuel-efficient car is a bigger commitment, now made all the more difficult as people with gas-guzzler SUVs are finding that trade-in values are plummeting. General Motors recently announced that is rethinking what to do with the biggest guzzler of them all _ the military-inspired Hummer.

Some tips that could help use less gas, helping both the pocketbook and the planet, are to be found on a website offered by the Washington, D.C.-based Alliance to Save Energy.

DEC may have finally gotten Albany’s attention about how the city has been handling garbage at the Rapp Road dump in the environmentally-sensitive Pine Bush. The city is pushing to expand the dump, even though the last time that happened, the city promised it would be the last instance.

Last month, a DEC regulator wrote to the city, saying essentially that the time had come for the city to consider what it would do with garbage without Rapp Road. And that vision had to include putting in real recycling rules in the city and the surrounding localities that use the dump, taking less garbage from outsiders and maybe even paying to send the trash to the various private landfills elsewhere in the state. That could mean millions less in garage fees that the city has grown accustomed to…

In an item related to the dump… It’s not every day that a Capital Region resident makes it on national television. But that’s just what happened in April on ABC, when a sitcom featured an episode involving the Karner Blue butterfly. The small butterfly is the bellwether species of that rare inland pine barrens in Albany, Colonie and Guilderland, the Albany Pine Bush.

Save the Pine Bush Secretary Lynne Jackson brings us this one. The April 22 episode of the sitcom “Samatha Who?” has the young heroine attempting to stop the killing of Karner Blues for a shopping mall. (Probably the owners of a certain mall in our area would not see any parallels). And the series writers apparently did their research, with Samantha explaining that the butterflies breed twice a year rely on lupine flowers for their food and (both true facts..)

2 Responses

I just returned from the State Capitol and ran into several of the Governor’s senior staffers. They are meeting today on the BB Bottle Bill, Brownfields Reform, and other environmental stuff, but nobody seemed very optimistic regarding the prospect of real action. The only smiles I saw were on the faces of Martin Sheen and a group of kids who interrupted their tour of the Senate for a photo op with “President Bartlett.” The feeling that I get is that our distinguished solons are heading for the exits.

Shelley is wearing his red tie today, by the way–does that mean anything?

The “Samantha and the Karner Blues” was quite accurate in its portrayal of our favorite, endangered, little blue butterflies. Unfortunately, the Karner Blues lose out in the episode, and, just like here, the maul is built.

We do not know yet how the Karner Blues will fare in the proposal to build a “Residence Inn” hotel on occupied Karner Blue habitat in the Pine Bush in the City of Albany. The proposed site (formerly owned by Crossgates Maul), was illegally bulldozed in 1998 by Crossgates, and now, the developers (Theraldson, the largest hotel company in the US) claim that there is no Karner Blue habitat an that no damage will come to the butterflies. Well, if Crossgates had not illegally bulldozed the property, maybe some habitat would still be there!

It idiot Albany Common Council originally approved this stupid hotel in the Pine Bush. However, after Save the Pine Bush sued the City over the approval and WON, the Common Council asked its lawyer not to pursue an appeal of our win. However, the lawyer for the Common Council ignored their request, and filed an appeal of Save the Pine Bush’s win. Oral arguments on the appeal were on May 30, and we await the court’s decision.

Save the Pine Bush has been suing the City and other municipalities for 30 years now to stop developments in the Pine Bush. I think if you took a survey, 90% of people in the Capital District would support Pine Bush preservation. Why are the elected officials so opposed to Pine Bush preservation? Do we really need mauls, landfills, hotels, office complexes in our beautiful, unique Pine Bush?

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